Things We Forgot To Mention ...

While driving through South Dakota there was one sight that we found particularly strange and beautiful at the same time. Fields of sunflowers. Literally, fields the size of corn fields. The vibrant yellow heads against the dull brown background looked strange, yet somehow amazing. You could look into the distance and see hills of bright yellow and orange. The sides of the road also yielded smaller runaway sunflowers that must have been carried on the wind. These small rebels continued to be found along the road even after we had passed all the fields. Unfortunately, I was unable to get any pictures because my camera battery decided to die, and by the time I had charged it, we had left the golden fields in the dust ... literally :-).

The southern end of Minnesota is considered the northern end of the corn belt (according to my dad, and he should know). Therefore, we saw ridiculously huge fields of corn. There would be miles of corn fields, and then a small farm. Then more miles of corn fields, in all directions. There were a few large feed mills to go along with the general farming society that is southern Minnesota. It also appeared that some of the farmers had decided to cash-in on wind energy. Huge wind turbines could be seen spread out for miles over sections of fields. In some areas there were probably over 20 wind turbines in eye-sight. To me, it was kinda freaky to see this mechanical monstrosities towering over the country landscape. I kept wondering what would happen if one of the blades fell off, or what they do when a tornado comes through and rips one of the blades off. The blades are pointy and huge, probably a couple times longer than the Volvo.

Their method for road construction in SD, WY and MT, involves closing the entire side of the highway they are working on and re-routing traffic to the opposite side of the highway. Despite the magnitude of the construction, we experienced no delays. There is so little traffic on I-90 in these states that there is no problem with turning an interstate road into a single lane road.

Oh and did I mention that we've had a 75 mph speed limit since Minnesota?